Relatives of journalist Zhang Zhan, 38, sentenced to four years in prison in China for her coverage of the Covid-19 pandemic in Wuhan, wrote messages on social media stating that she is in poor health and near death.
Zhang’s brother, in a Twitter post, said the journalist is too thin and “may not survive the winter,” which kicks off in the country in December. “In her heart, it feels like there’s only God and his beliefs, no matter what,” the message reads.
Zhang was arrested in May 2020, still in the opening months of the health crisis, accused of “provoking disturbances,” a terminology often used against opponents of the regime led by Xi Jinping.
In February of that year, she had traveled to Wuhan, then the epicenter of the epidemic, and posted stories on social media, many of which focused on the situation in local hospitals.
Shortly after her arrest, the journalist began a hunger strike and was force-fed for months by nasogastric tubes. Just over a month ago, 43 NGOs dedicated to defending press freedom, including the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), released an open letter to Xi asking for Zhang’s release, explaining that she had suffered a significant loss of weight, developed stomach ulcer and esophagitis.
Several human rights organizations returned to demonstrate this Thursday (4). Human Rights Watch (HRW) said the episode is yet another in which the Chinese regime “allows a peaceful critic to become seriously ill while being unfairly imprisoned.”
According to the NGO, Zhang’s mother spoke to her daughter via video in October and said she could not lift her head due to lack of strength. The journalist is 1.77 meters tall and now weighs less than 40 kilos. “Governments must call for Zhang Zhan’s urgent release to prevent an already dire situation from turning tragic,” said Yaqiu Wang, the organization’s China researcher.
HRW added that conditions in Chinese detention centers are poor, often providing minimal nutrition and rudimentary health care, which violates human rights. “Unfair sentences handed down against activists in China often turn out to be death sentences.”
Reporters Without Borders also called on the international community to put pressure on the Chinese regime and secure Zhang’s release “before it’s too late.” “She was just doing her duty as a reporter and she should never have been arrested,” said the NGO’s East Asia representative, Cédric Alviani.
The direction of the Chinese prison system refused to give statements to the AFP news agency. One of the journalist’s lawyers said the family asked for permission to visit her in the Shanghai prison, but received no response, nor information about her current state of health.
Zhang has faced repression by the Chinese regime before. In 2019, she was detained by police in Shanghai for more than two months after expressing support for pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong.
Previously, her lawyer’s license was revoked after she participated in human rights activities and the signing of public petitions. According to HRW, the journalist’s mother was warned by authorities not to talk to the press.
In addition to Zhang, the first person known to have been tried for coverage of the coronavirus crisis in China, at least three other independent journalists – Chen Qiushi, Fang Bin and Li Zehua – are in prison for disclosing information about the health situation in Wuhan.
Since the beginning of the pandemic, Beijing has adopted a zero tolerance strategy against Covid, which was called into question by the arrival of the more contagious delta variant. The country has registered about 98,000 cases of the disease and more than 4,600 deaths and has just over 74% of the population fully vaccinated, according to data from the platform Our World in Data, linked to Oxford University.
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